They finally took down the plastic sheeting on the scaffolding outside my bedroom window. One year and six months the sky was hidden from me. The stars and sun and moon invisible, testing my resolve. I could feel the sun sometimes, just a tiny bit. Don\u2019t forget me! I prayed. Now the oak tree in the inner courtyard who signaled to me the changing of the seasons returned to greet me, his sad, dry leaves swaying in the dark air. He was there all along of course, like the sun, far removed from my view. Oh, ye of little faith, he seemed to be saying as he bowed over my room.<\/p>\n
The first night after the removal, I swung the windows wide open and peered up past the scaffolding. I caught my first glimpse of the half ripe moon, begging me to greet her and harvest her rays. Mars twinkled underneath her, just over Pisces. I know this because of the planet identifier app on my phone, not because I know the real sky. The true heavens were veiled from me for so long I have forgotten the twinkling light of stars, the sweet rush of wind on a spring night, summoning my attention to nature; replaced by polymers, glass, and industrial creativity: byproducts of human genius.<\/p>\n
These screens that surround me are my mediated reality, the mark of our era. The screens we use for connecting us to the world instead leave me wanting more. Tangible, haptic, bloody, breathing, sweating, dripping, crushing, swaying, pulsing and emanating human and cosmic life.<\/p>\n
Did the oak tree miss me also? Did he wonder what seasons of grief, hope and sorry I was facing during this strange era?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
They finally took down the plastic sheeting on the scaffolding outside my bedroom window. One year and six months the sky was hidden from me. The stars and sun and moon invisible, testing my resolve. I could feel the sun sometimes, just a tiny bit. Don\u2019t forget me! I prayed. Now the oak tree in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":15548,"template":"","categories":[42,12],"class_list":["post-15603","stsp_text","type-stsp_text","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-issue-17","category-non-fiction"],"yoast_head":"\n